This post carries on my recent exploration of how the Restorationist vision of having a church following the New Testament pattern actually works in practise. So far I have looked at liturgy, worship, and leadership. Now “communion”, which is the preferred name in Restorationist circles for the “Lord’s Supper”, “Breaking of Bread”, or “Eucharist”.
It’s obvious enough that the communion meal was important to the early church. Acts 2 and 1 Corinthians 11 indicate that it was a regular feature of church life. But as with so many other aspects of church life, we are not given precise instructions as to how to conduct the meal, and how often to hold it.
The Restorationist churches I have been to all seem to follow a typical Baptist church structure. The Lord’s Supper comes at the close of a time of worship, probably once every four Sunday meetings, and follows a fairly fixed pattern – a Bible reading (usually 1 Cor 11), a prayer, and a time of quiet contemplation as the bread and grape juice are passed around.
I can’t help wondering whether we fail to properly appreciate this meal. Perhaps it is because it is not celebrated as a meal at all – only the smallest amount of bread and wine are actually consumed, and no one speaks to one another during the whole affair. Of course it is understandable why things are done this way – the logistics of providing a meal to over 100 people are not easy.
Another issue that many new churches have with the communion meal, is that it seems too liturgical and sombre for them. We are used to a very informal meeting style, and generally trying to be upbeat and happy all the time. As a result it can seem like an awkward intrusion into the normal program – something we do because we ought to, rather than because we want to. Please don’t misunderstand, I don’t feel that it is done in an inappropriate way – just that it doesn’t seem to be something we do really well.
For some time now, I have been thinking that the communion meal is perhaps something that small groups could be encouraged to make use of more. Meeting with up to a dozen people in someone’s home is an ideal setting to enjoy fellowship together. Time in prayer, worship and Scripture reading, with maybe a short meditation on one of the many rich themes found in the meal could be included. This way it doesn’t feel like communion is being squeezed into an already busy meeting schedule.
My first attempt at this was earlier this year, and I’m hoping to make this a more regular feature of the cell group I am leading. I still think there something very important about the whole church gathering together for communion, but if we are serious about following a New Testament pattern, then there should also be times when we break bread together in our homes (Acts 2:46).
Mark,
Another excellent and insightful post – well done, I think you’ve really tackled the issues!
My own position has become so much *more* sacramental. I find myself more and more thinking about the vital importance of communion and that, throughout the service of worship, this event forms the climax of our collective action towards God.
Certainly the more traditional liturgies (Orthodox/Catholic/Anglican) see Eucharist as the climatic element of the ‘worship event’ and one that is only postceded by the ‘dismissal’ (to go out into the word to live and work to God’s praise and glory).
Eucharist is seen as the Spiritual ‘impulse’ which speeds us out into a world that is in painful need of Christ.
My own feeling about the New churches (and perhaps more consciously ‘evangelical’ churches – certainly following the more Zwinglian/Baptist/Puritan/Non-comformist slant) is that the communion is something that we ‘should do’ but don’t quite know how and where to ‘do it’!
Thus it feels at best a bit ‘tacked on’ or ‘plugged in’ or at worst a bit ‘odd’ – and I sometimes wonder whether the free church practice of NOT doing communion weekly is because we don’t quite know what it’s ‘for’ and how it might ‘work’, so we are happy to ‘leave it out’ more often that we include it!
I personally have a view that it is a vital act of Communal Spiritual (capital ‘S’ – Holy Spirit) transformation, which operates on a level higher than ‘mere symbol’ but also on a different level from superstitious ‘magic’. It *is* a ‘mystery’ (musterion in Gk translated into ‘Sacramentus’ in Latin) and isn’t open to scientific (or anthropological) analysis (despite Aquinas’ best efforts using Aristotles ideas about dual ‘substances’ – or ‘ousias’ – to explain the Spiritual ‘change’ (or transubstantiation) that occurs within the bread and wine themselves).
I’m with Calvin on it being ‘effective through faith’ and would see it as a regular, necessary part of Christian transformation – like hearing/reading the bible, praying, singing, encouraging and meeting together etc….
Certainly it is clear from the earliest church evidence (Acts 2) that this particular ‘activity of Christian worship’ formed a vital and central aspect within the primitive jewish church.
I agree that the logistics of Eucharist in our larger church gatherings makes it some what different from anything the early church would have been able to imagine – but many Cathedrals successfully provide communion week in, week out to hundreds of worshippers – so one feels that perhaps the organisational as well as the ‘theological’ nettle probably could be *more* grasped by the New/Free etc.. churches?
Richard
I like what you are saying about it being “effective through faith”, and the “mystery” aspect to it.
Strangely enough, many charismatics take exactly this line with tongues speaking. They make it a discipline to be performed regularly, even when they don’t necessarily feel like it, believing by faith that it will edify them.
We need to start thinking the same way about the Lord’s Supper – it is a “means of grace” for us – why would we not want more of it?
Hi Mark
I think we’ve been short changed in this area for far too long. There has to be more to the breaking of bread than we currently settle for. It often seems to be an awkward ritual that falls short of really feasting on Christ.
As you’ll recall, I touched on this when I preached on Acts 2 a few weeks ago. I think we are in danger of slipping back in to formality and individualism when we take communion. And I agree with you that we should be celebrating this meal more often as we meet in our homes.
I’m planning to do some serious reading on the subject in the new year and have got a handful of books to work through, including “Given for You: reclaiming Calvin’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper” by Keith Mathison. Any other recommendations?
Steve
I always seem to miss your sermons Steve! I think its the one you gave me on CD though, so I’ll be sure to have a listen as soon as I get a chance.
I don’t know of a single book on the subject of the Lord’s supper. Perhaps that is an indication of how much the subject is neglected. I would be interested in knowing what you come up with.
The other books I have ready to read are:
The meal Jesus gave us, Tom Wright, Hodder 1999
The Covenant Meal, David Matthew, Harvestime 1988
The Mystery of the Lord’s Supper, Sermons by Robert Bruce (1589), ed Thomas Torrance, Christian Heritage 2005
I have to wonder how serious Restorationists are at following the biblical model. The preferred name is communion, but of your list the only one used in scripture is breaking of bread. The biblical model does include it as a meal, a whole meal, with some time presumably to go through what we do have of Jesus’ institution of it with the bread and wine. It also includes doing it whenever the local congregation gathers together. I’m not saying we should do all these things, but Restorationists as you’ve described them seem to want to do everything exactly as the NT believers did them (except presumably when the way the NT believers did them is said in scripture itself to be wrong, as with most of the things we know about the Corinthians believers).
Restorationists have no desire to create some kind of historical reenactment society where we dress in 1st century clothing and speak in New Testament Greek. However there is a passionate belief that the church can be altogether more glorious than it has tended to be throughout history, and that this is acheived by being faithful to a New Testament pattern or model.
However, as you rightly point out, its not that easy to determine exactly what should be considered as part of that model, and this is something I was trying to pick up on in this post. The “breaking of bread” has simply been copied from other denominations (usually Baptist/Brethren) rather than being rethought in light of the New Testament.
I’m sure you are more than aware of the hermeneutical conundrums surrounding all kinds of issues such as wearing of head covering, use of spiritual gifts, style of worship, leadership structures etc. We may not reach consensus on all these things, but like all evangelicals, Restorationists desire to mine the Scriptures for any patterns or advice that relate to different practises of church life.